Aishwarya Rai was born in Mangalore, in the South Indian state of Karnataka, to Krishnaraj Rai, a marine engineer, and Vrinda Rai, a writer on 1st of November 1973.Rai attended the Arya Vidya Mandir at Santacruz, Mumbai, then entered Jai Hind College, Churchgate, and Mumbai for one year and then moved to Ruparel College, Matunga, Mumbai to finish her HSC. She was an A student and was on track to become an architect. Her mother tongue is Tulu.She also speaks Hindi, English, Kannada, Marathi and Tamil. Rai began modeling on the side while pursuing for studies in Architecture, which did not materialise. In the 1994 Miss India contest, she was controversially placed second behind Sushmita Sen, and went on to win the Miss World title that same year and the Miss Photogenic award. After a year of reign as Miss World in London, she then worked as a professional model, in advertising and Indian fashion magazines and later got into Aishwarya debuted in Mani Ratnam's Tamil language film, Iruvar (1997) with Mohanlal. She was introduced to Bollywood in the film, Aur Pyaar Ho Gaya; the film did not do well at the box office.
